Zugunruhe

ornithological term for “migratory restlessness”

They shift and mutter in the darkof their cages, the barsan insubstantial lattice before the wheeling domeof stars brightening ever earlier;the magnetdrawing them like iron filings—a tugthrough the breastbonewhere the wing muscles tense—pointing them, indifferent to perchor seed or bath,facing the way of travel

Yesterday the starlings poured across the sunset skyin a shimmering riverendless currents made of flightit flows through me still

At nighttossing and twisting in the sheetsI stare unseeing,my mouth moves, searchingfor other languages,in my chest a flutteringthat will not give me ease

Olivia V. Ambrogio’s work has been published in over 25 journals and anthologies, including Sugar Mule, Electric Velocipede, Café Irreal, and Fugue. A native Detroiter, she headed east to get a Ph.D. studying the sex lives of marine snails. In spite of the surprising allure of this research field, she ended up in science communication in the D.C. area and does writing and photography whenever she can.